NBA Rumors: Door is open for Pistons to make another Blake Griffin trade

The Detroit Pistons are at a new low point of the season, a mark they seem to be hitting nearly every day.

They’ve lost nine in row, have the worst record in the league again, are still without several key players and the fanbase is getting restless.

Some are calling for Troy Weaver’s job, others for changes in the lineups and rotation, while some have just given up and are enjoying the Lions, who might end up with more wins this season than their NBA counterpart in Detroit.

Some are getting desperate and begging Troy Weaver to make some kind of move to improve this roster and get Cade Cunningham some help before his legs fall off and his 3-point percentage dips below the equator.

We’ve been here before.

The Blake Griffin trade: Short-term gains, long-term destruction

Back on January 29th, 2018, the Detroit Pistons shocked the NBA world by trading Avery Bradley, Tobias Harris, Boban Marjanovic and a 1st and 2nd round pick to the LA Clippers for Blake Griffin, who played the final 25 games of the 2017-18 season in Detroit after spending his entire career up to that point in LA.

It was a risky move by Stan Van Gundy, who was both coach and President of Basketball Operations at the time, but luckily for SVG he didn’t have to face the aftermath, as he was fired the following May.

The Griffin trade gave the Pistons some short-term rewards, as they did make the playoffs the following season and Griffin was fantastic, making the All-NBA team and having one of the best all-around seasons of his career.

He carried Detroit to the playoffs on one leg, where they were eviscerated in four games. It was a disaster after that, as Blake was injured, never got right and the Pistons ended up having to pay him huge money to leave, a hit on their cap space that set the team back years.

With Tobias Harris still playing well and Griffin out of the league, it’s fair to say that one didn’t work out for the Pistons.

And they could do it again.

Detroit Pistons: Trading for Zach LaVine

Yesterday, Shams Charania of The Athletic reported that teams are sniffing around Zach Lavine, who the Chicago Bulls might make available for trade:

Trading LaVine makes perfect sense for the Bulls, as they aren’t going anywhere with this current roster and it’s time to blow it up and start over. Most of the suitors will likely be contenders like the Lakers and 76ers, but the Pistons could get involved if Troy Weaver, like Stan Van Gundy, is desperate enough to try and save his job with a short-term fix.

There are trades that could potentially work for both teams:

I’ve mentioned that Jaden Ivey is one of the Pistons’ only trade assets and moving him might be a way to fix their roster and salvage their season.

In this trade, the Bulls get a young talent, draft capital and two big expiring contracts (Bojan’s isn’t fully guaranteed next season) which would be a great start to a rebuild.

The Pistons get the scorer they’ve been missing all season, an under-30 two-time All-Star who would take a whole lot of pressure off Cade Cunningham.

The deal makes sense in some ways, as Detroit needs a shake-up, they need a proven star and LaVine can be an elite scorer.

But this would be setting themselves up for another disaster.

The Detroit Pistons should not trade for Zach LaVine

I should first say that I like LaVine and think he would make the Detroit Pistons better right away, but those gains would be short-term and could end in a long-term disaster, just like the Griffin trade.

LaVine is the same age as Griffin was then, and coming off a pretty good run of health. But this is a guy who has had knee surgeries that have cost him a ton of games, not ideal for a team like the Pistons who can barely keep an NBA roster together because of injuries.

But there are other reasons this would scare me.

Zach LaVine hasn’t been very good this season

LaVine is averaging 21 points per game this season, but is taking 17 shots to get them. He’s shooting 40 percent from the floor and 30 percent from long range. His scoring average was bolstered by the 51-point game he had against the Pistons, otherwise he’s been fairly average.

The Jaden Ivey factor

Are we really ready to give up on Jaden Ivey? Call me crazy, but if Ivey were getting 17 shots per game instead of eight, I’m pretty sure he could put up better numbers than LaVine is right now. In the best-case scenario, Ivey becomes a prime LaVine at some point in his career. As it stands he’s averaging 11 points per game on less than half the attempts LaVine is getting and his assists and rebounds aren’t far off LaVine’s even though he’s playing around half the amount of minutes. And if Ivey has seen these minutes reduced because of defense, it’s hard to see how LaVine is any different, as he as just as bad if not worse on that end.

Then there’s the money

Jaden Ivey is on a rookie deal and under team control for several more years. LaVine would also be under team control for three more seasons (player option on the third) but will be making $43, 45 and 48 million per season in that time. He’ll be making $48 million in the final season, when he’ll be 31 years old, which sounds an awful lot like the Blake Griffin situation in Detroit. I fear we’d be looking up in three years to see Ivey thriving, while LaVine limps around, similar to the Tobias Harris/Blake Griffin dynamic.

Like most of you, I am dead sick of losing and this team is slowly sucking the life out of me. It would be exciting to get LaVine, and who knows, it may work out, but it reeks of the type of move a desperate GM trying to save his job would make, and history tells us that’s the type of move the Detroit Pistons should avoid.